Sylvia's Journal

I started off the day with Obama’s speech for breakfast; food for the soul. It was the speech he made on Tuesday in Philadelphia. I listened to the entire speech while reading along with the text. It was a feast for the ears, less so for the eyes, so the YouTube video itself did little for me. The speech inspired and moved me and then moved everyone in the nation to speculate about its effect on the elections. I liked his refreshing proposal to talk about race relations. What he proposes is that we engage in productive conversations. Since that (productive conversations) is my life’s work, it resonated deeply with me.

Tessa, Steve and their fast growing puppy Chicha arrived last night just when Jim and I were getting to the final untangling of intrigue and misrepresentation by Hercule Poirot in another one of Agatha’s brilliant mysteries. That will have to wait. The puppy bounced into the house, followed by two tired drivers. They made the long trip from the Canadian London in less than 11 hours, bad weather all the way. So our house is full again; Sita’s return from the other London on Friday will complete the picture.

I dragged myself into the house only two hours earlier after a much too long day at work. My departure date of March 26 looms large, not negotiable at this point. The program for Kabul is asking for my attention. But I am not ready yet; there is much still on my desk(top) that needs to be removed.

In between the oatmeal and coffee I tried to call my niece Emilie who is in the hospital in Holland to find out how she is doing and whether she wants the book back that she sent us last summer (the Art of Idleness). I have a feeling that she could use it now. I may bring it along when I leave for Holland next Wednesday. She did not answer her phone. Cellphones are nice but they make us overconfident in our ability to reach someone, no matter where he or she is. I failed in that just now.

Last night, when Tessa and Steve had arrived I called Axel to tell him so but failed to reach him (those cellphones again). Jim had to go into town and fish him out of our local pub – it sounds so Irish, it must be the St. Pat’s day afterglow – where Woody and Gary and comrades had taken him after some town event or another. It is the usual route after every such town event. Since the accident it is not half as much fun for Axel, especially when your wife tells you ‘only non-alcoholic beer!’ I never checked and suspect he had something else. Are we acting out some age old script?

Today will not be a workday in the usual sense. A non-profit arm of a for-profit consulting group has offered to do some pro-bono work with our senior managers, that includes me, around conflict management. Such things are good for a bunch of people who thrive on harmony. It will be nice to be on the participant side of things for a change and I hope to pick up some new ideas. However, it also blows an entire work day for which I will have to pay later, no doubt.

For once Tessa does not need to read my blog to find out how I am doing. It has been the main source of information about her parents, maybe providing more information than she cares to get. For the next few days we can show and tell rather than write and read.